[Order]

The trouble with this "it's all luck" argument is that you assume everyone born into identical conditions ends up in an identical situation. But some people are born poor and end up rich. Or, more often, people are born poor and end up somewhat comfortably middle-class, like me. The circumstances of one's birth can't be the only deciding factor, especially in the broad first-world vs. third-world sense that you mention, or everyone "lucky enough" to be born in a first-world country would be equally rich.

You assume that luck only comes into play at birth. However, rich people are usually lucky there whole life because, lets face it, even a tiny unlikely accident at some point could have forced you into poverty. (Getting sick early in your career without proper health insurance anyone?) And many opportunitites came to them for exactly the same reason, pure luck. There are many more superhard-working people out there than super-rich people.... Chance is determining our life to a much larger extent than just setting the starting conditions. On the other hand, even if you are supersmart and hardworking (note that this is also to a large extent determined by genetic luck but let's ignore that for a second), if born in some African country to a family of peasants you will in all likelihood end up as one too.

Was it just luck that Henry Ford was able to produce inexpensive automobiles by using innovative assembly line techniques?

Ford was lucky enough to meet the right people at the right time offering the right opportunites. Of course he contributed to that by being inventive and working hard but that alone did not make him successful.

To declare that a person's wealth is based entirely on luck is ridiculous and naive.

Entirely, yes. But the amount of real agency left after subtracting genetics and luck in life is probably not enough to justify not paying taxes. If we assume that something like free will really exists, that is.

[Kiroff]

Please explain why.

Social instability, lower employment as people have to find ways to survive without welfare, going into illegitimate sectors of the economy.

[hannigaholic]

What gives you the right to services that you did nothing to earn, paid for with money that I DID earn, but was taken from me?

I want a serious, rational answer.

Essentially I'd say it's because some form of tax-funded government is necessary if we don't want to end up in an anarchy, which would likely descend into economic Feudalism. Government exists, in my view, to facilitate economic activity, through infrastructure and regulations, and to correct market failures, such as the non-existance of privately owned street lighting. That such facilitation and correction is beneficial to society is what I feel justifies the concept of taxation.

Ultimately, I believe you're directly benefitting by paying taxes, because most roads, emergency services and the like wouldn't exist otherwise. With regards to services such as healthcare and education, it's arguable that you are directly benefitting from other people being healthier and better educated, since they won't take as many sick days and will come up with new ideas that will improve efficiency of whatever work you do.

Now, that doesn't necessarily mean I think income tax is the best way to tax people - I can see the arguments for extensive land tax and/or sales tax instead, with specific exceptions designed to ease the suffering of the properly poor. It also doesn't mean I support all the uses to which tax revenue is put. In fact, if anybody did, I'd think them insane.

[Zerogouki]

Social instability

That is so vague as to be meaningless. Please clarify.

lower employment

Whoa whoa whoa... are you seriously claiming that lower taxes = lower employment?

people have to find ways to survive without welfare, going into illegitimate sectors of the economy.

People are perfectly capable of surviving without being leeches AND without "going into illegitimate sectors of the economy".

Essentially I'd say it's because some form of tax-funded government is necessary if we don't want to end up in an anarchy, which would likely descend into economic Feudalism. Government exists, in my view, to facilitate economic activity, through infrastructure and regulations, and to correct market failures, such as the non-existance of privately owned street lighting. That such facilitation and correction is beneficial to society is what I feel justifies the concept of taxation. Ultimately, I believe you're directly benefitting by paying taxes, because most roads, emergency services and the like wouldn't exist otherwise.

That's nice, but COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT to the matter at hand, which is the welfare state.

With regards to services such as healthcare and education, it's arguable that you are directly benefitting from other people being healthier and better educated, since they won't take as many sick days and will come up with new ideas that will improve efficiency of whatever work you do.

1) Since when has government been able to provide higher-quality services than the private sector?
2) Even if what you say was true, would the health and education of other people benefit me so much that I'd earn 50% more money per year, thus offsetting the tax burden? Highly dubious.

[Demosthenes]

Toward the OP,

Why should I pay for roads for you to use, fund a police department that protects you, fund mail service and public schools for you or your children when you haven't earned any of these things?

[Infidelis]

That is so vague as to be meaningless. Please clarify.

I can't speak for Kiroff, but without taxes, infrastructure and law enforcement wouldn't be paid for. This is especially important in more deteriorated and lower socio-economic areas: Lights added, abandoned buildings attended to, low level criminals dealt with, basically attending to the figurative "broken windows" that accumulate and become more serious problems that spread to other areas...quite possibly yours, because of unforeseen factors like gentrification.

People are perfectly capable of surviving without being leeches AND without "going into illegitimate sectors of the economy".

Okay, A.) How? and B.) Why do people go to "illegitimate sectors of the economy," and how do we fix that as a society without taxing to pay for law enforcement, corrections, infrastructure, financial assistance and low income housing?

[grassroots1]

What gives you the right to services that you did nothing to earn, paid for with money that I DID earn, but was taken from me?

I want a serious, rational answer.

People do.

Sorry I'm kinda riding that wave right now.

But really, when people collectively decide that there needs to be a change they will go through with it regardless of whether you think they have the 'right' to or not. That wealth was never yours, that's the fact. Nothing has been stolen because nothing was owned. The only thing that ever said it was yours was the standard of property rights which USED to be upheld, but no longer is.

[RonPaulalways]

But really, when people collectively decide that there needs to be a change they will go through with it regardless of whether you think they have the 'right' to or not.

No one's disputing this, what we're disputing is whether this is morally right.

That wealth was never yours, that's the fact. Nothing has been stolen because nothing was owned.

Someone could turn around just as easily and say to you, that you don't own your life, so if someone kills you, nothing was stolen since you never had a right to your life any way.

Your positions are essentially immoral/anti-human.

[grassroots1]

I don't care whether you think it is morally right, the powerful people will have their way (this can be a big group or a little group).

Someone could turn around just as easily and say to you, that you don't own your life, so if someone kills you, nothing was stolen since you never had a right to your life any way.

Your positions are essentially immoral/anti-human.

How could I deny that in their mind, I had no right to my life? And of course I don't own my life, I experience it. It's not immoral to acknowledge plurality, the idea that people have different beliefs.

[TropicalK]

I think grassroots' argument skills suck, it must be true because I think so.

Grassroots: We have guns and are gunna kick your ass, I have the right(?) to take your stuff.
Everyone else: Just because your more powerful doesn't give you any rights.
Grassroots: I can do anything I please. Your belongings were never yours, they're mine now bitches.

[grassroots1]

I'm not saying that that is how I'll act on it, but it is my belief that matter cannot have an owner. The universe is composed of matter, including you and me, and its forces are constantly interacting, combining, and reforming. How could we, specks of life on a planet on the edge of a galaxy, claim to own a piece of matter that is so connected to us in an interactive, fundamental way?

Once I heard that every seven years, the average person goes through the cycle of replacing every single cell in their body, so that there is no cell that was there seven years before. Whether or not this is entirely accurate, it expresses the point that I'm trying to get across, which is that people are PART of their environment, we cannot OWN it. All we can do is manipulate our environment for our own benefit, there is no ownership from my perspective.

I'm sorry if I haven't done a good enough of describing why I believe what I believe.

And my only other point is that if all people hold the belief that I do, there will be no private property, which means it is not infallible.

[Holding]

That's a slippery slope, grassroots1. Do you idealise a society based on that idea, or do you find it best that your opinion is in a minority?

[grassroots1]

I obviously don't find it best that my opinion is in the minority, I wish more people agreed with me.

[Zerogouki]

Why should I pay for roads for you to use, fund a police department that protects you, fund mail service and public schools for you or your children when you haven't earned any of these things?

1) Roads, police departments, and the postal service are not part of the welfare state.
2) Roads are paid for by gasoline taxes, so people who do not use roads do not pay for them.
3) The postal service is, or at least is supposed to be, funded by postage stamps, not by taxes. People who never use the postal service would ideally never pay for it.
4) Please, for the love of God, stop giving your money to my local police departments and public schools. They have caused me nothing but grief. (this is not sarcasm)

I can't speak for Kiroff, but without taxes, infrastructure and law enforcement wouldn't be paid for.

Again, hasn't anyone been paying any fucking attention to the fucking thread? I'm talking about the WELFARE STATE.

Okay, A.) How? and B.) Why do people go to "illegitimate sectors of the economy," and how do we fix that as a society

A) By getting a legitimate job and not overspending. Duh.
B) They do it because those sectors pay well. The best way to fix that is to end the War on Drugs, legalize prostitution, and repeal most gun laws.

That wealth was never yours, that's the fact. Nothing has been stolen because nothing was owned. blah blah universe blah blah forces blah blah combining blah blah more bullshit

[grassroots1]

I already gave you your serious, rational answer.

"But really, when people collectively decide that there needs to be a change they will go through with it regardless of whether you think they have the 'right' to or not. That wealth was never yours, that's the fact. Nothing has been stolen because nothing was owned. The only thing that ever said it was yours was the standard of property rights which USED to be upheld, but no longer is."

Even if you disagree with my worldview, although I wouldn't be able to tell, seeing as how all you did is use a smiley, you can at least assess my answer to your question instead of laughing at me.

[Zerogouki]

That answer was nowhere near rational. It was flimsy moral relativism, which is always an attempt to justify anarchism, mixed with some metaphysical one-with-the-universe Buddhist crapola.

Come back to the thread when you've grown up and you're no longer selling Che shirts at Hot Topic.

[grassroots1]

I don't know why you feel the need to try and reduce me as a person without addressing my argument. Your question is why should you be forced to pay for the benefit of other people, and I'm telling you that in the situation, you can understand why people don't view it as robbery. In an idealized sense, I can understand why one person stealing from one person is an unjust act, there is no question. But that is not the situation that I see in front of me.

[Holding]

grassroots1, you agree that if your belief regarding ownership were the majority opinion, that there would be a dramatic drop in productivity and thus things to consume?

Why would a farmer bother growing food if somebody else could just go and take it all? Why would people build houses if somebody else could just take it? Everybody would only put effort toward things that could be consumed immediately and there would be no resource investment at all.

[grassroots1]

I don't see why there has to be a decrease in productivity just because people have modified or developed their conception of the universe. Just because people don't have a direct, personal incentive like money to motivate their actions doesn't mean they will stop working altogether and leach off of society. I don't think this would happen for two reasons: 1) Money is not even close to the only incentive that drives people's actions. Despite the fact that it exists as a measure of 'success' for those who live in our society, there are still many people who find money to be only a means to an end, or not a means at all, instead of an end in itself; and 2) We're talking about a radical change in the thought processes of many individuals, what we're discussing is a social revolution; the customs, tendencies, motivations, and incentives that we have within the capitalist system may or may not exist post-change. So someone who leaches off of the government, depending on their community, may be socially ostracized and looked down upon for his unwillingless to participate in the care of their community, society, and environment.

[Holding]

I'm not talking about money, I'm talking about consumption. If you have something you can use of value, it can be taken from you. With no ownership, there is nothing to stop that from happening. With no ownership, people wouldn't build machines - they could simply be taken. People wouldn't grow food they won't consume immediately - it could simply be taken. If people don't bother making intermediates, they won't bother (or have the ability to be) making things like any more clothes that they can wear, houses to live in, computers to operate, books to read, etc. They would be no different than a wild animal.

Unless everybody abandons their instinct to consume. Unless everybody stops being human. Even if there is one group, going around declaring and enforcing property rights (which will give it an edge in production of say, weapons and defenses), the system would easily fall apart and the group could travel around conquering over the others. A complete loss of our biological and psychological humanity is a bit far fetched though. You may as well talk about a radical change in physics where resources become infinite and gravity is voluntary. It'd be as useful.